


Hometown

by artemris



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: #northernirishronanlynch2k15, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-15
Updated: 2015-08-15
Packaged: 2018-04-14 18:14:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4574775
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artemris/pseuds/artemris
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Adam had always been self-conscious of his accent. The way words slipped from his mouth in dusty tones and elongated vowels. It was a mark of the mother who bore him, a label sewn onto the back of his neck that read: "homegrown Henrietta trailer trash". It set him apart from the other boys of Aglionby who spoke in old money accents dipped in gold, fit for Congress and the socially elite.</p>
<p>He'd never felt comfortable in his own skin. But that was until he met Ronan Lynch.</p>
<p>  <i>or</i></p>
<p>that one where ronan is northern irish</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hometown

**Author's Note:**

> niall lynch was raised in belfast u say?? ok so have u considered this........ northern irish ronan lynch
> 
> the title was supposed to just be a top reference but then i started laughing bc if u take the lyrics literally "where we're from, there's no sun" it's horribly fitting

Adam had always been self-conscious of his accent. The way words slipped from his mouth in dusty tones and elongated vowels. It was a mark of the mother who bore him, a label sewn onto the back of his neck that read: "homegrown Henrietta trailer trash". It set him apart from the other boys of Aglionby who spoke in old money accents dipped in gold, fit for Congress and the socially elite.

He'd never felt comfortable in his own skin. But that was until he met Ronan Lynch.

Despite never having spoken to Ronan nor any of his friends, Adam knew the names well. They were the kind of people you always hear about but never have the nerve to approach. _Ronan Lynch and Dick Gansey III._ Gansey _,_ the son of a wealthy estate owner, West Virginia born and raised, who went by his surname only as petty rich boys in private schools were wont to do, and Ronan, the rogue Irish boy who no one truly understood but no one had the balls to question. It wasn't a deliberate avoidance on Adam's part; they simply moved in different circles, which was to say Gansey and Ronan moved in circles of status and Adam in none at all.

After his first encounter with Gansey, Adam thought that would be it. He'd been useful, but now he wasn't and, in typical rich boy fashion, anything that was no longer of use was to be disposed of. Nothing personal. But instead he found himself being invited further into Gansey's life, introduced to a circle of friends that seemed to consist of, well, just one. For someone so popular Adam was thoroughly surprised that Gansey didn't have more close friends.

"Ah, Adam!" Gansey called, having spied the top of Adam's sandy coloured head across the crowded Aglionby lunch hall. Adam frowned in confusion. He'd helped Gansey, Gansey had thanked him and driven him home and they'd gone their separate ways. That was it. So why would Gansey be concerned with him now? Had Adam fucked something up? Had he fixed the car only for it to break down later as a result of Adam's actions? Oh, God, something had gone terribly wrong and he'd _ruined_ it and-

"Adam?" Gansey's voice cut through his thoughts. "You kinda drifted off there."

"I, um, yeah, happens sometimes," he said feebly. "Did you need something?"

"I just wanted to ask if you wanted to join us for lunch, is all."

Adam glanced over Gansey's shoulder to a mostly empty table with the exception of the shaven headed teen who'd set half of his belongings over the table and surveyed the room with a look that challenged anyone who made eye contact with him.

Ronan Lynch.

It was a somewhat off-putting sight, though not quite as off-putting as Ronan intended, Adam was sure. He would have no problem challenging Ronan, but starting fights in the lunch hall was something he couldn't afford to have put down on his record and besides, from what he'd heard, Ronan could throw a mean right hook, so violence was decidedly off limits.

When he considered this, Adam was surprised to hear himself agree to Gansey's offer.

"Excellent," Gansey said with a brilliant grin. This, Adam thought, was Gansey's most striking feature. He had a way of smiling as he spoke that seemed to fill anyone who listened with confidence. Somehow it didn't matter to Adam how fearsome Ronan tried to look. In that moment he was sure that if Gansey had asked him to follow him anywhere he wouldn't have even questioned it.

Leading Adam enthusiastically by the arm, Gansey turned back towards the table. When he reached it he gave the side panel a swift kick. Ronan's head snapped up immediately with a frown on his face, eyebrows drawn and ready to snarl at the next person he laid eyes on, but the moment he saw Gansey he relaxed. Gansey appeared to have been granted immunity to Ronan's toxic attitude.

"Ronan, this is Adam," Gansey said, outstretching the arm that had been grasping Adam's left elbow to introduce him. To Adam he said, "Adam, this is Ronan."

Adam said hello with some hesitation, still a tad unnerved by Ronan's demeanour, but the other boy was nonplussed.

Ronan lifted his head and nodded in a semblance of a greeting. "S'craic."

Adam turned to Gansey, frowned, and turned back to Ronan. Of all the words in his vocabulary, 's'craic' was not one of them. He wasn't even sure it was a word at all. At least not in any language he was aware of.

"He's Irish," Gansey said as if that explained it.

Ronan looked up at Gansey with a savage grin. " _Northern_ Irish."

\---

As it turned out Ronan was not only Northern Irish, he was _obnoxiously_ Northern Irish.

He had a lazy way of speaking, drawing out the vowels of words, though it was markedly different from the way Adam did it. Adam's voice conjured up images of the dusty Virginia countryside, while Ronan's reminded him of small towns and rural upbringings despite his faint city twang. Ronan's accent had softened some through years of living in the states, but not enough to become a droning transatlantic drawl like some did. To Adam's untrained ear it was hard to tell where he was from. Ronan had finally told him after a week or two of knowing each other, when Adam had finally plucked up the courage to ask, about his upbringing on the outskirts of Belfast with his English-born but Belfast bred father and soft spoken small town mother. His voice was quieter when he spoke about his family, like he was giving something away and placing his trust in Adam. Adam could understand, having heard the stories in boorish boasts around Aglionby about the boy who'd found his father beaten to death with a tire iron and whispers about the boy whose mother had been comatose for years.

There was more than just his accent, though. It was evident in his mannerisms, in his personality. He spoke in strings of swear words that sounded like a form of abstract poetry, if 'fuck' and 'shit' were considered poetic.  The curses that slipped from his lips so often were only outnumbered by the times blood or liquor graced them. He looked the part too. Dark hair and icy blue eyes stood out from pasty white skin, gifts from his Celtic ancestors. During the warmer months freckles littered his pale skin, which he refused to acknowledge.

On these warmest summer days, nothing could persuade him to leave Monmouth. Instead he preferred the days when rain pelted the ground and he could brood comfortably from the warm interior of his father's BMW.

"We convinced him to go to the lake with us one time when the weather was good," said Noah, the little seen fourth resident of the building Gansey owned. "He scowled and spent the whole day sulking in the shade."

Adam laughed at him, but it was months before he found out how little Noah had been exaggerating.

\---

They had gone to scope out a new spot that Gansey had found interest in, all four of them, as well as Blue, the newest addition to their group. Blue always dressed for the occasion, quirky skirts and torn vest tops, while Gansey dressed in garish colours but he did, at least, have the sense to wear short sleeves. Ronan took this to a whole other level.

"Are you wearing _shorts_?" Adam asked the boy slumped against the tree trunk. Blue and Gansey were off exploring and Noah had flickered off someplace else that Adam wasn't entirely sure of. Adam had only stayed back because Ronan showed no signs of moving from the tree he'd claimed as his own.

"Fuck off, it's hot," he groaned.

Adam tried to hold back a laugh. Summers in Virginia were warm, but according to Ronan it had only two temperatures: Hot and hotter than the fiery pits of hell. It _was_ particularly warm that day, but no more than usual in Adam's opinion. Ronan disagreed. Adam had never seen him wear shorts before; Ronan dressed for style, not for the weather.

When Blue and Gansey came back they found both Ronan and Adam slouched under the same tree, Ronan wiping beads of sweat away from his forehead in disgust and Adam watching for the others to return amidst the haze of the heat. It took ten minutes to successfully coax Ronan out from under the tree and another five to encourage him to walk with them. After fifteen minutes of walking Ronan had given up.

"Can we leave yet? Yous ones can go for a dander anytime, just don't ask me to come along on a day like this next time."

"Have you never seen the sun before, Lynch? You know, it's that big ball of fire in the sky."

"Shut up, Parrish, back home summer consists of approximately ninety rainy days and two cloudy if you're lucky."

Despite Ronan's complaints they continued their investigation for a further hour or so, until Blue and Noah announced that they were exhausted. Normally they could both stay out for hours but the sun was beginning to get to them. After three hours in the oppressive heat Blue couldn't help but feel like she was being cooked alive, slowly, and she had serious concerns about how she was going to peel her clothes off later with the layer of sweat that had clung to them.

The ride back in the Camaro was a quiet one for the most part. Gansey rolled down all of the windows, partially to cool them down and partially to ventilate the car because five sweaty teenagers in one confined space never worked out well. It was on the ride home that Adam began to notice the patches of red spreading on Ronan's skin. After seventeen years of living in Henrietta Adam could probably count the times he'd gotten sunburned on both hands, but Ronan seemed not to have developed that resistance to the sun.

"Uh, Ronan?" When Ronan didn't answer he tried again. "Lynch. You might wanna check your arms."

Ronan looked up at Adam, then down to himself, at his arms and his neck and the horrible pink colour they'd turned.

" _Fuck_ the sun and fuck this country, man."

Gansey and Adam helped Ronan apply aftersun lotion to the worst affected areas when they got back to Monmouth. The task made Adam somewhat uneasy but he agreed anyway on account of the fact that Ronan could no longer raise his arms without wincing heavily each time.

"Why didn't you just wear sun lotion?" Gansey asked afterwards as Ronan sat tentatively on the edge of Gansey's bed, afraid to move anywhere else.

"It's because he's an eee-jiiiit," Noah sing-songed, appearing in the living room beside them.

"First of all," said Ronan, "you're not saying it right, and secondly, fuck off, Noah."

Noah grinned triumphantly and threw himself down beside Ronan, only looking more gleeful when Ronan flinched away violently. Blue came into the room then after searching in the bathroom/kitchen for something to help ease the pain somewhat.

"We never have any aftersun so my mom always uses yoghurt for sunburn because it cools your skin. You guys don't have any - and by the way, that fridge is disgusting, I am ashamed, Dick. Anyway I can bring some round later. That'll teach you to be an asshole next time, Ronan."

Gansey frowned at being called Dick while Ronan did the same over being called an asshole. Blue didn't bother pointing out that, technically speaking, both were true.

It took the guts of a week and a half for the inflammation to die down. By the end of the first two days Ronan had sworn never to go outside again unless the sun kept to itself and minded its own damn business, to which Noah snorted and replied, "You never go outside during the day anyway."

\---

"You know," Adam remarked to Ronan one day. "You're the most obnoxiously Irish person I've ever met."

 They were sitting beneath a tree much like the first the day Ronan got burned, except this time the sun was blocked out by clouds the colour of ash that gave them the distinct feeling that it was going to rain soon. Not that Ronan would mind that.

"Northern Irish," Ronan corrected him as he did every time. "And I'm the only one you've ever met."

"True, but still."

Ronan rolled his eyes and stretched out his muscles before laying down on the grass. He looked up at the clouds above them, arms crossed behind his head. He used to enjoy looking at the clouds as a kid, trying to see patterns in them and yelling at Declan for spoiling the fun when he suggested he play something else. He was younger then; a lot younger. Now he looked to the sky to alleviate the restless feelings in his bones and the nervous energy he got around Adam. It was fine when the others were around, but they weren't there today. Gansey was gone for the weekend, visiting his parents and Helen and Blue had already told them the last time they'd hung out at Nino's that she'd be busy at home and at work that week. Noah had vanished sometime around then too. He still showed up in Monmouth at night time, but where he went during the day was anybody's guess. They had considered pestering Blue at Nino's but it just didn't feel the same without Gansey steering the conversation towards their search for Glendower. Without him there they'd just be two teenage boys causing hell for their stressed out waitress.

Adam's voice startled him when he spoke again.

"I was thinking about when we first met." Ronan nodded his head in acknowledgement and Adam took it as encouragement to continue. "I was kinda shy, I didn't really want to get in anyone's way at Aglionby. I've always been really aware of how different I am to pretty much everyone else there. I guess I was embarrassed." He sighed, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly and turned back to look at Ronan, who'd sat up and was nodding slowly. "But then when I met you I realised I'm not the only one who stands out, y'know?"

Ronan snickered. "Charming, Parrish. I'm glad I could help you out."

"Shut up, Lynch, you know what I mean."

"Yes, Parrish, I do. I'm not that thick."

"You sure?"

"Oh, fuck off. Here I was going to tell you I liked your bloody accent and all and this is what I get in return."

He froze immediately after the words left his mouth. Sometimes he got so carried away with his teasing that it rendered his filter ineffective. He wanted to take it back straight away but to take it back would be a lie and that was something Ronan couldn't do. He opened his mouth, found no words to say and paused for a moment with his mouth agape before starting to snigger as though he'd just made a brilliant joke.

Adam wasn't convinced. He caught Ronan's moment of hesitation and the fleeting look of horror in his eyes. Praying he wasn't wrong, Adam pushed himself up on his hands and leaned towards Ronan, stealing a kiss. It was less than a kiss really. Perhaps the ghost of a kiss. It didn't matter though, because he could still feel the ghost of Ronan's lips on his own for a second before they were there again for real.

 

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote a fic with no plot that somehow ended up turning into pynch trash why am i not surprised tbh
> 
> also if anyone thinks i'm playing on northern irish stereotypes here let me tell u a story. today it was literally only 16 degrees. i wore shorts and complained about the heat while my family had a barbecue. we are not made for anything above 10 degrees my friends.
> 
> oh um i forgot to add this but if anyone is confused about 's'craic' - craic (pronounced "crack") is a gaelic word for fun. "what's the craic?" is a greeting derived from this (essentially "what's going on?" but it doubles as just saying hello) and we're lazy so most of the time we just say "s'craic" lmao


End file.
